Clockwork Kid

By Michael Chapey

Winner of Cycle Magic Mondays

I have this crank in my back with which someone needs to wind me up about every 24 hours. It's very steampunk. I'm all organic gears inside. It's how I operate. Click click onomatopoeia. How I've operated since I was born. You've probably read about me in the papers. The Incredible Clockwork Kid. I'm a medical marvel. Science can't explain me. I used to have this nurse who would stay with me and make sure I got wound up regularly, but I made a pass at her last night and she quit. Now I'm standing on a bridge in Prague and I can hear it all grinding to a halt. I haven't broken down in public since that night I got drunk and passed out on the boardwalk. Some busker found me in the morning. Very nice. Had seen my picture in a magazine. Asked for an autograph after he wound me up. People all around me now, but I don't know the language. I don't have the words to explain what I need from them. I'm shouting English! English! Crank! but I must look and sound like a madman, because people are turning their faces away. I can feel the momentum from my last wind dying. Movement quickly becomes more difficult until it's impossible. I'm there, immobile on the bridge, big wind-up key sticking out of my back, desperate look on my face, wishing I could speak Czech.


Michael Chapey lives in Los Angeles. He was born in New Jersey and raised in Connecticut. He went to USC. He’s had stuff appear on The Write Launch and Clumsy Quips. He has a podcast called Chapey Days. He has seen almost all of the Police Academy movies.